Structural color is observed in nature and has many characteristics that differ from those of chemical pigments or dyes. Typically color is due to light absorption, but structural color can both refract and reflect light. For example, ordered structural color/photonic crystals operate by reflecting light.
Owing to these characteristics, there have been attempts to make artificial structural color through various technological approaches such as colloidal crystallization, dielectric layer stacking, and direct lithographic patterning. The colloidal crystallization technique is used to make a photonic crystal, which reflects a specific wavelength of light in the crystal and therefore displays the corresponding color.
Structural colored surfaces can provide for customizing the visual appearances of articles of manufacture. Structural colored surfaces can also provide for adaptability and/or tunability to effect the visual appearance of a substrate.